Mark, I’m interested in hearing what you feel is proprietary about the handling of content? I usually assume proprietary means neither free nor open source. Pods is both of these. Do you mean that it simply differs from the normal “Loop” that WordPress uses?

I dont like the fact that it doesnt use posts or pages for the actual content. WP is built around pages and posts and what pods uses is completely specific to it, thus proprietery. It uses its own table for the data, thus you cant use any of the tools that would normally be associated with a page or post. So yes, the fact that it doesnt use the loop (pretty much the backbone of WP) makes it less than desirable to use. I think a majority of people are just looking for easy ways to have custom write panels to be honest, which no one has really provided a high quality, efficient, and user friendly way to that.

1. Pods is a Custom Content Type development framework – it includes the functions, database tables, and ui for Custom Content Types separate of the WordPress wp_posts table.

2. Pods doesn’t use Custom Fields, as this type of data storage and use isn’t what Pods is targeted at – The relational table approach is widely accepted by developers across the world, and while the wp_postmeta method works for simple types of content, we feel it is not suitable for more complex content types.

3. Pods isn’t proprietary, any developer can use the data, export and develop with the data however they wish – if it were proprietary, it wouldn’t be an open source and free project. We don’t tie users down and tell them they can’t migrate from or to Pods, that’s very easy for people to do with our API or by looking at the tables.

4. Regarding using the Loop, that’s something which I agree with you on. I would love Pods to use the loop and make it easier for people familiar with the existing WP API to develop with. However, given the nature of what Pods was built to do, the Loop wasn’t a suitable place for it. We have our own class which can be called to load the data in some pretty complex ways. I’m sure there are developers on both sides of the fence that could go on about the differences between the methods, so I’ll just leave it at – It’s your choice what you prefer and what’s best for you.

5. I agree that most people are looking for custom write panels, that’s something WP extremely lacks built in and there are a few good plugins working in the right direction. I’m excited to see what happens in that area. However, Pods isn’t a direct competitor to that method. Whether or not you believe it or not, Pods used to be tied into Custom Post Types, but we felt it shouldn’t be the default since most of our users need more complexity. But don’t let that fool you, Pods can easily be tied into the wp_posts table.

6. I recommend Custom Field Templates, Custom Post Templates, Magic Fields, amongst the slew of other up and coming plugins if you’re looking for something right now in terms of within the Loop. I’ve seen some work done towards giving some more built-in functionality with WP making it easier to develop custom post types with less development slated for WP 3.0 – Let’s all hope that gets done. I’m not as biased as you may think, I think there’s are certain tools better for certain jobs.

7. There are many things you may not know about Pods yet, all of which I’d love to help explain if you would like more information. The major point of Pods is to give developers more choices to use as they determine the best solution for their needs. There are many cases in which Posts and Pages are suitable, also many cases in which Custom Post Types themselves are suitable. But I’d argue there are equal amounts of cases across the line from Posts / Pages / Custom Post Types / and Complex Content Types with Pods.

8. I will be putting together a video with a full tutorial on how to use Pods, both in a Simple and Advanced format depending on the viewer’s preference. I’ll see about posting them to WordPress.tv once they are ready.

8. Mark, I’m always available for future discussion about this, you can contact me through my website http://www.scottkclark.com/ and we can continue there if you’d like. We’ve got a lot of things in the works for the upcoming versions of Pods and Pods UI.